


for glory, god, and gold

by TheLillie



Category: He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Apocalypse, Assisted Suicide, Babies, Bad Decisions, Bad Parenting, Brief Violence, Character Death, Child Abandonment, F/F, F/M, Gen, Grief/Mourning, HEY SO ABOUT THAT S5 HUH, Imperialism, Mother-Daughter Relationship, Suicide Attempt, Time Travel, War, babies ever after!!!, baby he-man is super cute though, golly gee, in case it's not clear I don't think anything Marlena does in this fic is good right or justified, it is a happy ending i promise it is, kind of. not quite but kind of., no such thing as a good colonizer kiddo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-13
Updated: 2020-06-09
Packaged: 2021-03-03 04:15:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24168700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheLillie/pseuds/TheLillie
Summary: “The Sorceress said my children were born for a purpose,” Marlena said. “She said their blood would make them strong. Stronger than Mara, maybe…”“You'd let Eternia lose an heir to the throne?”“Light Hope will bring her back to us. And in the meantime... we'll still have another.”--“I'm―”She took a breath, deep as her lungs would allow.“Marlena, queen of―I was queen of Eternia. Wife of King Randor. Mother to Prince Adam, and to…“ She swallowed. “A princess I sent to Etheria, in the hopes she'd become She-Ra and destroy the Horde.”“Eternia?” The man almost dropped his tablet. “You―you're a First One?”The woman stepped in front of him. “You're Adora's mother.”Adora. She had a name. Someone else had named her.
Relationships: Adora/Catra (She-Ra), Bow/Glimmer (She-Ra), Marlena & Adora
Comments: 45
Kudos: 514
Collections: Shera





	1. Gold

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I don't like it, Papa,” she said. “But then I dare say soldiers - even brave ones - don't really _like_ going into battle.”  
> ― Frances Hodgson Burnett, _A Little Princess_

_ january _

The queen bore identical twins, both healthy and blonde, and loved them with all she had the moment she laid eyes on them. The king might have loved them even more, if that were possible.

Love wasn’t the only thing in the room at the birth, though. The Sorceress of Castle Grayskull wasn’t a gloomy person, per se, but her presence always brought the sense of gloom impending. Probably just a side effect of her ability to see the future.

“Their hybrid blood will make them strong,” she predicted. “Half Earth, half Eternia. There's never been anything like it.”

King Randor smiled and kissed his wife's forehead. “Strong and perfect.”

“They've been born for a purpose,” the Sorceress said. “We must inform Light Hope.”

“Yes, yes!” Randor agreed, too caught up in his joy to be deterred by her solemness. “Tell Light Hope, tell all Etheria, tell the whole galaxy and beyond. These two will bring such glory to the empire!”

The Sorceress kept her attention on the children. The second-born infant, cradled in Queen Marlena’s right arm, seemed to particularly hold her interest. Marlena pulled the baby closer to her chest, as if she could shield it from that piercing psychic gaze.

“And more,” the Sorceress said.

* * *

_ april _

Eternian tradition was to wait to name a child until they had been fully weaned―just a leftover from earlier times, when infant mortality had been much higher. Back then it was a precaution, but now it was a whole ceremony, especially for children as important as these two. That didn’t stop Marlena from brainstorming a little early, though.

“I just want something...simple, and classic,” she said one evening, lounging in bed with the four-month-old children asleep on her chest and her husband by her side. “Anne or Elizabeth or something.”

Randor wrinkled his nose. “Are those even names?”

“They’re Earth names,” Marlena laughed, tucking herself into the nook of his shoulder. “They're perfectly lovely American girls’ names.”

“We'll give one of them an Earth name. The other has to be normal.”

The baby on her left breast stirred a little, squirming and squeaking without waking. 

“You know what's silly?” Marlena said softly.

“What?”

“There’s one name that I’ve been attached to since I was little. I’ve always wanted to have a child named Adam.” She sighed. “But I can’t now, since they’re both―”

“There, then,” Randor said, pointing. “We’ll call that one Adam.”

Marlena opened her mouth to argue―then closed it. She smiled and ticked her tongue. “I always forget how useless the concept of gender I grew up with is here.”

_ “Your Majesties!” _

In unison they both looked up at the cry from the hall, now calling for them by names. Randor leapt to his feet and out the door; Marlena gingerly tried to sit up without disturbing the babies. Soon the shouting was accompanied by the sound of approaching footsteps, running desperately toward them, fighting past the murmurs of passing guards and courtiers. One baby she managed to lower silently into the crib; the other started fussing.

“News, Your Majesties! From Etheria! Dire news!”

Marlena gasped. “Etheria?”

She shifted the baby’s weight on her shoulder and pushed into the hallway. Randor stood worriedly before a panting, doubled-over messenger. From their red face and mussed clothing, they looked nigh fresh from a battlefield.

“Is the Heart online?” Randor asked. “Is it ready?”

The messenger shook their head, grimacing. “No, sire, it’s―it’s the opposite. Mara―she―she turned against us all, she―”

“Calm yourself, swift one.” Randor gently held the messenger’s shoulder and motioned for an attendant to assist them. “You can catch your breath before you tell the whole tale.”

“Tell us one thing,” Marlena countered, chasing them. “Where is Mara now? If she turned against us, has she been stopped? Imprisoned?”

“She’s dead,” the messenger huffed. “She’s gone. She, the other colonists, the whole―the whole planet.”

Marlena raised a hand to her mouth. The messenger managed to lift their weary head and look at her.

“Etheria is gone.”

* * *

_ may _

Adam matured faster than the second-born twin. A month after Marlena picked the name, the official ceremony was held―yet the other child still clung to her mother’s breast, nameless.

“Despite your father’s best efforts,” Marlena murmured to the baby. “I am not calling you Veena.”

She knew this one was a girl, for certain. She could feel the child’s own certainty in her heart. Adam’s decision on the subject remained to be seen―whether they’d accord with the name or with Marlena’s first notions or with something else entirely was up to whoever they grew up to be.

Marlena shifted the little princess’s weight in her arms and wandered out to the empty balcony outside her bedroom. It was quiet all around; Randor still had Adam in the great hall with the rest of the naming party. The old orange sun was setting over the warm horizon. The whole kingdom seemed peacefully drowsy, full and relaxed, ready for a long nap after a satisfactory day’s work. People below her were talking, laughing, playing; trees rustled and breathed; in the distance, the desert glittered.

She exhaled, shoulders dropping, and let herself be swept away in the view.

“I love this planet,” she said.

“Mm, it’s not bad.”

She jumped at the new voice, clutching her baby close, but quickly loosened.

“If it isn’t the powerful Man-At-Arms, back from another noble conquest,” she teased. “Why aren’t you downstairs?”

Duncan stepped onto the balcony. “I didn’t want my dramatic return to interrupt your kid’s party.”

“Randor will want to see you. If not for the kids, you’d be the only thing he would have talked about all month.”

“I’ll see him in a minute.” Duncan lay his hands on the balcony railing and stared out over it. He didn't seem concerned with the landscape, as Marlena had been―he looked up, at the stars peeking out into the dusk.

Marlena tilted her head. “Did everything on your mission go all right?”

“Phemera-7 is back under Eternian control, though the Horde put up a few battles. But that's not what I wanted to talk about.” He drummed his fingers on the railing. “I've been in contact with Light Hope.”

“What? How?” Marlena gasped. “They said Mara completely destroyed Etheria.”

“She didn't destroy it―she stole it. She pulled the entire planet into Despondos. But Light Hope has been working all this time to get through.”

“How could she get through from Despondos in just a month of work?”

Duncan shook his head. “It’s outside of time as well as space. According to the last message she sent, for her it’s been over nine hundred years.”

Marlena stepped back.

The baby woke and started fussing. Marlena lightly hushed her, grateful for the distraction from her shock.

She paced back into the room, bouncing the baby and rifling through her thoughts in a vain attempt to organize them.

“Nine hundred years,” she repeated. “Then Mara must really be dead by now.”

“She killed herself and the rest of her mission in the process of her betrayal,” Duncan said. “But the native population was preserved.”

“If Light Hope can send messages, could she open a full portal?” she asked, sitting down on the edge of her bed.

Duncan hesitated. “Yes. But not very well.”

“What does that mean?”

“The last battle for Phemera-7, a portal opened. It was only open for a second, and all it sucked through was a defective clone and his broken ship, but it led to Etheria. If she managed it once, and if I reach back out to her...we might be able to open a second one.”

“We need to. We need to send someone else to wield the Heart.”

The princess had fallen quiet by now. Marlena propped her up on her lap, holding her little wrist in one hand and supporting her back with the other. The baby blinked and burbled, her eyes big and wet and impossibly bright blue.

They were intelligent eyes, too. Focused. Unwavering. Pure and curious and purposeful, studying her.

“What are you thinking now?” Duncan asked warily.

“The Sorceress said my children were born for a purpose,” Marlena said. “She said their blood would make them strong. Stronger than Mara, maybe.”

“We can't wait for her to grow up. If a month here is nearly a millennium there―”

“If she grows up on Etheria, she can connect with the sword earlier.” Her voice was low and flat. “More securely. It'd be intertwined with her whole being.”

“You'd let Eternia lose an heir to the throne?”

“Light Hope will bring her back to us. And in the meantime...we'll still have another.”

“The king won't see it that way.”

Marlena stood and crossed to the baby’s crib, lining up her information in silence. Etheria was still out there. The native population was preserved―that meant the Runestones, the princesses. The Heart of Etheria was still a viable weapon. All they needed was a new She-Ra to wield it. An Earth-blooded, Eternian-born, Etherian-raised princess―a triple-planet hybrid―could be the strongest She-Ra ever made. All they needed was a portal to put her through. All that could stop them was a parent’s own indecision.

“Then let's do it now,” she said. “Before he can find out.”

“Your Majesty, I insist you―”

Marlena whirled on him. “Remember your place, Man-at-Arms!  _ I  _ insist!”

“Your child―”

“My planet!” she cut him off. “If we don’t press every advantage we have, take every possibility for every opportunity to be stronger than the Horde―”

“Is beating the Horde more important than raising your own child?” Duncan asked. “Knowing they’re safe, and loved?”

“It’s more important than  _ everything!  _ Every day the Horde encroaches on the borders of our empire, threatening our peace, defying our ways, conquering and destroying without reason or remorse―” She sucked in a deep breath. “With a strong enough She-Ra in Etheria, we could wipe them from the sky and be rid of them forever. My child has that strength. And if you continue to question me on this, then as your queen I will hold you suspect of treason.”

Man-at-Arms stood back, fists clenched at his sides. He inclined his head in a slight bow.

“Alright,” he said. “I’ll take you to Castle Grayskull.”

* * *

The Sorceress was expecting them. She opened the door and bowed as they approached. 

“I take it you know why we're here,” Duncan drawled as they entered. “And can tell Marlena she's crazy without fear of repercussion.”

Marlena shot him a glare, but Duncan had already settled into bitter acceptance, and couldn't be cowed further.

“No. She isn't crazy. In fact...I empathize.”

She beckoned them toward a staircase. Marlena pressed the baby's face into her shoulder and followed; Duncan nodded to the Sorceress and jogged ahead.

“I've been working on reaching back to Light Hope for several weeks now,” the Sorceress said as they descended. “It won't take much more for the portal to be ready.”

Marlena pinched her lips together. Duncan was much further in front of them now. She held her quiet child a little tighter. “I'm doing the right thing, then?”

“You're doing an incredibly difficult thing,” the Sorceress said without looking at her. “And I know how it's tearing you apart.”

Marlena held her breath. Duncan had reached the bottom of the stairs now, and disappeared through a door.

“Tell me.” She stopped walking and clutched a hand to the back of the baby's head. “Is it going to work?” 

The Sorceress paused.

Marlena took one more step, to stand on the Sorceress's same level. “Tell me all of this isn't going to be in vain. Will she become She-Ra? Will she destroy the Horde?”

“She will wield the Sword of Protection,” the Sorceress said, slow and deliberate, carefully choosing her words―not like she was coming up with a lie, though; Marlena could tell she was absolutely convicted of what she said. “And in her hands it will be… _ glorious.” _

“Will she be happy?”

The Sorceress was silent for a long time. She looked at the baby. She looked at Marlena.

“Yes.”

Marlena swallowed, shoving down a heaviness in her throat and forcing her demeanor to steel. “Will she be loved?”

“Yes.”

This time the answer was immediate. Marlena's steel became foil, thin and fragile as paper. Relieved, happy, overjoyed―but fragile.

“Go.” The Sorceress stepped back and bowed toward the door at the bottom of the stairs. “The portal is ready.”

* * *

The gate was a circle of dark metal, empty against the wall, dotted with flashing lights and buttons and wrapped with wires like overgrown vines. A loose rope of cords connected the frame to a heavy lever on the ground, where Duncan solemnly waited.

Marlena lowered the baby from her shoulder―awake but still―and cradled her head in the crook of her elbow. The baby blinked up at her and squinted. She cupped her round cheek in one hand and kissed her hot forehead.

“You must be strong, little one,” she whispered. “You must be brave.”

At her nod, Duncan hefted the lever forward.

A crackle of energy sparked in the center of the empty gateway. Then all at once it blazed to fill the circle, lightning-white and buzzing. Marlena held up an arm over her eyes, resisting the urge to step back.

The white turned to violet, still sizzling and popping at the edges, and then gave way to a clear view of an overgrown field and starless sky. Etheria. 

“If you’re going to do it, do it!” Duncan urged. “I can’t keep it open long!”

Gritting her teeth, Marlena pushed forward, arms held forth. The portal flashed. The baby started crying.

“I’m sorry, little one,” Marlena coughed, stretching to hold her further away from herself. “I’m so sorry, darling, I’m―”

She was standing on Etherian ground. The portal coiled electric purple arms out to her, tugging her back. She bent, strained, knelt, struggling against the portal’s pull.

The baby cried louder. She laid her down in the pale grass.

“Get back through! It’s closing!”

Marlena forced her head upward, but kept her hands on the child’s blanket. She didn’t want to see her face when she let go―

There was something moving at the edge of the field.

“Your Majesty!”

Moving fast, something dark, and tall―some _ one,  _ with a white face and glinting armor _ ― _

_ “Marlena!” _

sprinting towards her―

Duncan grabbed her arm and forcibly yanked her back.

Marlena crashed to the floor, and the portal snapped shut. The smell of burnt rubber attacked the room―the soles of her boots had just barely made it through.

“No,” she breathed. “No, Duncan, reopen it―reopen the portal! We have to take her back!”

“We can’t. That was―” Duncan was doubled over, panting, clutching the portal’s disabled lever for support. “It’s too much. We’ve lost all connection to Light Hope for good now.”

“No!” She shoved to her feet and slammed her fists against the empty wall behind the gate. “No, no, no! We can’t leave her there with―”

“Your Majesty, you knowingly decided this,” Duncan said, swallowing his breath and lowering his voice. “I know how you must be feeling, but―”

“The Horde,” Marlena cut him off. “I saw a Horde clone, right there, and it saw me and it saw the portal and it’s going to take her and it’s―it’s going to take her. We lost her. We’ve…“

She stopped.

And then she whirled and strode toward the stairs, fists clenched, the tears on her face vaporizing. Her stride became a run, and she was storming alone through the castle, not caring about the pain each hard step sent arcing through her legs, not caring that Duncan was still calling after her―

She burst out onto the balcony, where the Sorceress was watching carefully over the landscape. The Sorceress spun at her entrance. “Marlena―”

“You lied to me. You  _ lied _ to me!” Marlena shouted, shoving the Sorceress's shoulders. “Fix the portal! Bring her back!”

The Sorceress stumbled back against the railing, but didn't raise a hand to defend herself.

“I did not lie,” she said softly.

“You told me she would be safe!”

“She will be loved. And years from now, she will―”

“How many years?!”

“Marlena, I promise you,” the Sorceress pleaded, “she will grow up  _ adored _ . Mothers will give their lives for her, lovers will tear their hearts to shreds for her―”

Marlena shoved her again. “And my life?  _ My _ heart?”

“A casualty of war.”

The queen let out a wordless roar and flung herself away, hands held to her head. The Sorceress gingerly pushed herself up from the balcony railing and squared her shoulders.

Marlena didn't look back at her; didn't wait for Duncan.

When she returned home, shaking and singed and alone, Randor couldn't bring himself to press when she refused to answer his questions. She collapsed into his arms and cried silently.

* * *

_ january _

Adam was just-now two years old and apparently firmly set on becoming a lively, charming, rambunctious young prince. His nurses could barely keep track of him sometimes. Fortunately, now Duncan had a child of his own, and had gotten quite good at controlling Adam as well as his own little Teela.

Still, though, there were times like this where Adam would break free of his caretakers, and take off running as fast as his pudgy legs could take him into his mother's study.

“Mama!” Adam squealed, reaching her chair and tapping earnestly at her thigh. “Mama, see! Mama, see me!”

Marlena leaned back and smiled at him. “I see you. You want up?”

“Up! Up!”

“You're lucky I'm not really working this time.” She reached over and lifted him into her lap. “Just...looking at old pictures.”

“Leela?” Adam asked, pointing at the holopad lying on the desk. It was displaying a photograph of a two-month-old infant, dressed in fluttery gold and white, head adorned with flowers and a tiny brass tiara.

“Are you trying to say Teela?” Marlena chuckled. “Can you make the 't' sound?”

Adam proudly bared his front teeth. “Tih, tih, tih.”

“Can you say 'tee'?”

“Tee.”

“Now say 'la.'“

“La.”

“Now say 'Teela.'“

“Leela.”

“Oh, you'll get it eventually,” Marlena surrendered. She leaned back and let Adam situate himself more comfortably in her lap, facing the desk.

He pointed again at the image on her holopad. “Leela.”

“No, that's not Teela,” Marlena said softly. “That's your little sister.”

“What’s a lil sisser?”

“Mama and Papa had another baby when you were born,” she explained. “She was your little sister.”

“Anov―amoth―” Adam struggled through the syllables. “Nover baby?”

“Mm-hm. But she died, in an accident, when you were both very little.”

He bounced. “Nover baby! Leela!”

There was no changing his mind, it seemed. “That's alright. Teela's all the little sister you need.” She kissed the top of his head. “And you're the only baby I need.”

“I'm a big boy.”

“You are a big boy. But you're also my baby.”

He was bored of talking. He pushed up to his feet and fell forward onto her chest, gnawing and drooling at the collar of her dress.

Marlena softly stroked his feathery hair, staring at her holopad. Staring at her lost little princess.

But she wasn’t a princess. She’d never even been given a name. And now she was long gone. Vanished and dead. And Eternia had all it needed without her.

Marlena reached forward and tapped the bottom of the screen to pull up a small menu. The baby's picture faded behind it.

_ Delete image? _

_ This is permanent and cannot be undone. _

_ OK / CANCEL _

She pursed her lips and tapped  _ OK. _


	2. God

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I’m just braver than most people.”  
> “Brave is being scared, and facing your fears. You are something else. Beat it, _kunlangeta―_ before I bite you.”  
> ―Betsy Lee, _No Evil: Suspect_

The king was dead.

Most everyone was dead. Marlena was nearly dead. The Horde had made its way to Eternia and was razing the planet to rubble. But Randor was dead, and she couldn't think about anything else.

She bent over the window, hands slick in his blood that scraped along the sill, the last few seconds flashing relentlessly in her mind. The clone's gun firing twice, thrice, four times, opening burning gashes in Randor’s chest and driving him back to slump against the cutout of the wall. Her fist colliding with the gun from the side and then with the clone's face. The pound of her heart as she shoved her enemy to the window; the knowledge that her husband had already succumbed to his wounds; the sick salt taste of her own tears on her tongue as she opened her mouth to scream. Both bodies falling hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of feet to the dark crags and spires below, and Marlena staying above.

A close explosion shook the castle and flashed orange across the slate gray sky and jolted Marlena out of her shock. She staggered back from the window and pressed her palms to her temples. She had to think, she had to think―

There was no saving Eternia at this point. The Horde had taken far too much ground and had started spreading its infection to the planet itself. The few survivors of the palace's siege had managed to escape to Grayskull for a few weeks, but now their stronghold had become their prison―their coffin. The Horde was exterminating them here.

But the castle still stood, and that meant the Sorceress was still alive. And amidst the clamor of war she could hear Battlecat's roars and Teela's desperate shouts of defense, and that meant no harm had yet come to He-Man.

Marlena grabbed the fallen clone's gun from the floor and ran from the tower, almost losing her footing down the stairs with each explosion but never slowing. He-Man would be posted at the door to the castle’s central chamber, the last defense before the Sorceress. And just below the Sorceress there would still be an old empty gateway, that with all the power of Grayskull just might be able to open a portal.

She reached the center of the castle, the stolen gun smoking and fresh Horde blood spattered on her clothes. But it wasn’t He-Man guarding the door there―it was Adam, kneeling down and staring blankly forward, the Sword of Power lying dull on the floor beside him.

Randor had died without ever knowing who his son and his hero truly were.

Marlena inhaled sharply, sucking back her grief. She dropped the gun and slid to her knees and gripped Adam’s shoulders. “Pick up the sword. I know a way to end this.”

Adam jerked away from her, eyes snapping to hers. For a second his expression was clenched in hot rage, but then it laxed―eyes going wide, brows arching and forehead wrinkling. Fear. Confusion. Betrayal.

“I c―I can’t,” he said, lightly shaking his head. “I w―”

“What do you mean you can’t?” Marlena gently took his face in her hands, cradling each corner of his jaw, weaving her fingertips into his feather-yellow hair. “You can! You have the power to stop all of this!”

“My power is for Eternia, Mother. It comes from my faith in it.” His voice broke. “And I don’t―”

“You  _ are _ Eternia’s faith. Baby,  _ you _ are the power to―”

_ “Listen to me!” _

The castle rumbled and lurched, pebbles scattering down from the ceiling.

He wrenched out of her grasp again and shoved to his feet. Marlena watched him, stunned. He was breathing hard. His face was lined with tear tracks.

“Right before Orko was shot down, he―” He swallowed back a sob. “I had a vision, of when he first came to Eternia. It wasn’t a storm that brought him here. It was Eternian soldiers.”

“Eternia saved him, Adam,” Marlena said. “You saved him.”

“I saw Trolla from before Eternia touched it. From before we―we s-smothered it. We erased it! We  _ killed  _ it! And that’s what we do to every planet we find, isn’t it?”

Marlena almost laughed. “Sweetheart, Trolla was a mess before us! Pure chaos that we organized, that we transformed―”

“It was  _ people!”  _ Adam cut her off. “Every planet we find has people and culture and magic and beauty that Eternia just rips away and takes for our own, just like the Horde!”

“We can’t let the Horde win!” Marlena stood. “Do you really think letting them destroy us is going to be better?”

Another lurch. The ceiling hailed down chunks of rock heavy enough to bruise. Instinctively, reflexively Adam jumped to protect Marlena―

_ CRACK. _

Adam shouted in pain as a slab of stone crashed down on them both. Marlena reeled to the ground under his arm and saw stars at the impact. Her body was pinned under rock, but her arms were free―she pulled herself as far forward as she could―she craned her neck up to see Adam. He was inches in front of her. She balled one hand into a fist.

“Hate me, fine,” she said. “Hate our empire, hate Eternia. But don’t―let―the Horde―win.”

Adam winced and strained against the boulder on his back. 

Marlena took his hand and guided it to the sword.

“There’s a way we can destroy them forever,” she said. “A weapon that we could access, with you and the Sorceress and the castle. And once we get it, the Horde will be gone.”

Adam squeezed his eyes shut as his hand closed around the sword's hilt. A light blue glow flashed its way up his veins, inching under the skin of his arm, then glitched and faded.

“I can't,” he panted. “I can't―”

“You can,” Marlena urged, voice low. “Adam, please, it's the only way to stop this.”

His eyes met hers. Big and wet and impossibly bright blue.

He seized the sword.

In a surge of light he was transformed, and he shrugged off the fallen stones almost effortlessly. He grabbed Marlena’s arm and pulled her to the Sorceress’s door without a word.

The Sorceress was motionless on her throne. She hunched over, leaning heavily on the armrests. She breathed, but didn’t blink; her eyes were wide and glassy, a gold rim of light swirling around each iris as she watched the battle outside. The dormant portal was beside her, the wall behind it still stained charcoal-black from its last use twenty years ago.

“Your plan is unforgivable, my queen,” she rasped.

“I’m not looking for forgiveness.” Marlena lifted her chin and stood before her. “Will you or will you not comply?”

“It won’t matter.” 

The Sorceress turned her clairvoyant gaze directly to Marlena. The gold light stopped swirling. It glowed straight and unmoving.

“It won’t work,” she said.

The castle shook. Marlena held He-Man’s arm to keep balance.

“Don’t play games with me this time!” she snapped. “Open the portal!”

The Sorceress thrust out her arms and the Sword of Power shot a lurid beam at the empty gateway. He-Man jolted, but held firm. 

Marlena exhaled and didn’t blink away the bright heat in her eyes. The portal flared and spun, and then steadied. Her hair floated and writhed at the energy crackling off it.

“It will work,” she declared, stepping forward. “You promised me when I sent her here.” She extended a hand to the radiant portal. “My daughter will annihilate our enemies with the Heart of Etheria and my planet will be avenged.”

“Your daughter?” He-Man gripped the sword tighter to keep from faltering. “You told me my sister died as a baby!”

“The Heart of Etheria will never be used,” the Sorceress said. “By the time your princess reaches it, Eternia will be a thousand years gone and this universe will be free of us.”

Marlena gritted her teeth and tore her eyes away from the portal. “What are you talking about?”

The Sorceress had not removed her gaze.

“The portal you sent her through was out of the universe and out of time. Etheria won’t return for a thousand years.”

She stood up from her throne.

“The Heart will  _ never  _ be used.”

Marlena’s stomach roiled.

It was a trick. It was all a trick, from the very beginning, from the moment the princess was born―the Sorceress had been planning this all along. She’d intended every moment of this, every choice Marlena made, every tear she shed, every regret she buried, every drop of blood she spilled―all wasted, all a  _ waste,  _ at the hands of her most trusted seer. All to bring Eternia’s greatest power to ruin.

“Teela has fallen,” the Sorceress whispered, swaying slightly. The glow in her eyes went abruptly out. “Grayskull is lost.”

“You traitor,” Marlena spat, eyes burning. “You  _ traitor!  _ You’re just another pawn of the Horde! You  _ always have been!” _

“No.”

The Sorceress shook her head and lowered her arms. The battle outside roared and crashed and boomed and screamed to a climax. The ceiling shattered and pelted and rained. He-Man dropped to his knees.

“I am a friend of Mara.”

She lifted a hand and closed a fist, and the room exploded.

* * *

Marlena opened her eyes.

Her surroundings were silent but for the faint, distant calls of birds and insects. Her face was pressed into soft, pale grass. She could breathe, shallow with her broken ribs, but couldn't move further without pain.

Two pairs of footsteps rustled toward her through the grass, and stopped.

“Wow, it's some dead lady. Gross.”

“I don't understand. This is where the readings were centered. Is she―”

Marlena managed to bend one arm up, surprising the man into silence and startling a short yelp from the woman he'd been talking to.

She slowly pushed herself to her knees. The two people standing there stared at her―a young man with curly black hair and midriff-baring gold armor, one hand holding a thin holographic tablet and the other gripping the bow on his back; a freckled, scowling woman in red, armed with nothing but the sharp black claws on the ends of her hands and bare feet.

“I―I mean no harm,” Marlena rasped. “I don't―”

She glanced back at the space where the portal must have spat her out in the final blast. Just empty sky now. No way back.

Grayskull had fallen. Eternia had fallen. Randor was dead, Adam was dead, Duncan and Teela were dead, the Sorceress was a traitor. Marlena held a tentative hand to her abdomen, but jerked it back at the surge of pain it sent through her. Even if she were to somehow get these injuries tended to, she had hours left, a day at most.

“Got an explanation for the energy readings on Bow's tracker pad here?” the woman interrogated, gesturing to her companion's tablet. “Cus they look an awful lot like an interdimensional portal was just opened.”

“We need to know where you came from, how you got here, and why,” the man said calmly. “Then we can take you somewhere to see about those wounds.”

“I'm―”

She took a breath, deep as her lungs would allow.

“Marlena, queen of―I was queen of Eternia. Wife of King Randor. Mother to Prince Adam, and to…“ She swallowed. “A princess I sent to Etheria, in the hopes she'd become She-Ra and destroy the Horde.”

“Eternia?” The man almost dropped his tablet. “You―you're a First One?”

The woman stepped in front of him. “You're Adora's mother.”

Adora. She had a name. Someone else had named her.

That was all Marlena was able to think before she lost consciousness.

* * *

She woke up in a bed, to the sound of softly rushing waterfalls. The sheets over her were thin, cool linen. The ceiling above her was high and curved, lit with floating cradles of white and pink and gold. Large windows all around let in dark night air from outside. Her burnt and bloody clothes were gone; her torn skin was bandaged and her broken bones were set.

She twisted her head to the side.

Two small white chairs were set up beside the bed. In one sat the freckled woman from earlier, sprawled over the lap of the woman in the other chair, lightly snoring. The other woman was tall and blonde, staring solemnly forward and stroking the freckled woman's dark brown hair.

It was easy to recognize her. She looked almost exactly like her brother.

“Bow said you told them you sent me here,” Adora said without looking up. “You abandoned me on purpose.”

The freckled woman twitched her feline tail, but didn't wake.

“Did it work?” Marlena asked.

Adora scoffed. “Yeah. Congrats. I got the sword, I killed Horde Prime. Everything went exactly according to  _ your _ grand plan for  _ my _ whole life.”

“I didn't plan for the Horde to take you.”

Adora's fist clenched in the freckled woman's hair.

“It worked out,” she said, voice stiff and detached, like she was talking from behind a screen. “It...it gave me Catra. And I wouldn't have been able to do any of it without her.”

Catra―that must be the woman in her lap. Fitting.

“Did the clone give you your name?”

“The cl―oh. Hordak.” Adora shook her head. “His second-in-command raised us both―she was the one who named us. I guess she wasn’t very creative.”

“I imagine she must have been a better mother than I.”

Adora’s stolid stare morphed into a sharp, acridly sarcastic grin. “Well, she sure didn’t intentionally abandon me as a baby on an alien planet, so the bar is pretty low, but―”

Her eyes met Marlena’s.

As quickly as it’d come on, her bitter smile dropped, and she returned to that quiet stare.

“No,” she said. “She wasn't a good mother at all.”

She and Adam had inherited their blue eyes from Randor. The blonde hair was a bit mysterious―Marlena's hair had been almost that light as a child, but it darkened to a mahogany-brown by the time she grew up. The jaw was Randor's, the nose was Marlena's, the mouth was a little of both. But the resemblance to Adam wasn’t exact―the princess was thinner, paler, bone and muscle rough and taut under her skin. Proof that while he grew up in a palace in the sun, she grew up a Horde conscript.

But...she must be happy now, mustn’t she? She lived in a bright, lush home, with a woman she clearly dearly loved. The Horde was defeated and she was free. She’d grown tall and powerful and graceful as a princess should be. She’d suffered, but she’d got through it.

Obviously Marlena knew this ostensibly happy ending wasn't enough to redeem her, but it was at least enough to keep her heart in its place in her chest.

There came a knock at the door on the other side of the room, then a creak as it opened. A pink and purple head poked in, followed by the curly-haired archer―Bow.

“Is she awake yet?”

Adora sat up, shoulders stiffening. “Go easy on her, Glimmer.”

“Not likely!” Glimmer threw the door the rest of the way open and strode into the room, fists clenched at her sides. She was a delicately-dressed but undeniably forceful woman, bold and present and commanding, and the pitch of her voice was doing no favors for Marlena’s headache. “Talk, lady. We wanna know how you got here and why, and also, what the heck is wrong with you?”

Bow lightly held Glimmer’s shoulders to slow her down. “She still looks like she’s in bad shape. Healing first, then interrogation.”

“Interrogation first, and if she doesn’t tell us everything we might not heal her at all!”

“Hey!”

Marlena winced, head stabbing with pain at the sudden shout. She slitted her eyes open to the side of her bed. Catra was awake, kneeling up on her chair, one fingertip pressed to Adora’s forehead.

“Maybe we let the healer decide,” Catra said.

Glimmer and Bow fell silent. Adora nudged Catra’s hand away from her forehead and held it to her chest, her gaze still on the floor.

Catra kept eye contact with Marlena and stood. “But maybe Her Majesty of Eternia doesn’t  _ want _ to be healed.”

This time Marlena’s wince wasn’t quite from physical pain, but it felt near enough. Catra’s voice was soft, but sharp and keen and aimed meticulously for her center. Marlena let out a breath, and let it take any remaining pride she had with it.

“Eternia is destroyed. Every last remnant has been gone for centuries by now. The portal I came through was the last thing the planet could conjure before it was eradicated,” she confessed. “I have nothing to return to.”

“So was this just...you wanted to see Adora?” Glimmer said. “One last time?”

Marlena huffed out an almost-laugh. “I’m afraid I’m not the kind of person to have intentions so pure. I was after the Heart.”

“The Heart’s gone,” Adora said bluntly. “We destroyed it two years ago. Tomorrow’s the anniversary, actually.”

“Uh, wrong.” Catra blew a short raspberry at Adora. “Tomorrow’s  _ our _ anniversary. Saving the universe is less important than that.”

“Shut up. You’re such an idiot,” Adora said, but there was nothing but affection in her tone.

“Don’t turn my line back on me.  _ You’re  _ such an idiot.”

“I love you, too.”

She must be happy. She  _ must  _ be happy.

“What about Light Hope?” Marlena asked.

Adora's smile fell. “She's gone, too.”

Catra turned her attention back to Marlena and clicked her tongue, a hand on her hip. “Really sucks when your genocide-suicide plan doesn’t work out like you thought it would, huh?”

“Stop it.” Adora dropped Catra’s hand and fixed Marlena with a steely glare. “Could another portal from your time ever open again?”

“No. With Grayskull gone, with Light Hope gone...no.”

“Then you really have nothing.”

Marlena pushed her head back into the the pillow and stared at the ceiling. Why had she shoved through that collapsing portal? Why didn’t she just stay and die with her son, with her kingdom? Why had the daughter she betrayed and discarded chosen to bind her wounds? What was she alive for?

Nothing.

The She-Ra of Etheria had the power to heal most anything. That was one of the first discoveries Mara had relayed to them when she held the sword; She-Ras of other Eternian conquests were pure weaponry, but Etherian magic had intertwined with Mara and changed her. If Adora decided to heal her, Marlena could live for decades more.

If not, then even with this temporary care, Marlena still wouldn’t last the night.

“Adora?” Bow said. “What’s the plan?”

Adora stood.

“Just get some more rest for now,” she told Marlena. “I’ll be right back.”

She pulled Catra along with her, and gestured for Bow and Glimmer to follow. The door shut quietly behind them.

Marlena closed her eyes and tried not to think. Tried to focus on the sound of the waterfalls. Breathed in. Breathed out. Breathed in.

Breathed out.


	3. Glory

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Though I than he may longer live, he longer must than I―for I have but the art to kill, without the power to die.”  
> ―Emily Dickinson, _My Life had stood―a Loaded Gun_

Adora leaned back against the closed door.

“I don't know,” she said. “I don't know what the plan is.”

Bow and Glimmer answered in unison. “Well, obviously―”

“―we heal her.”

“―we don't heal her.”

Glimmer gasped and whirled. “Bow, she said she's after the Heart of Etheria! She's dangerous! And evil!”

“Well, she's not dangerous  _ now,” _ Bow replied. “She's Adora's mother. Like, her actual flesh-and-blood mother.”

“Yeah, that doesn't mean squat to us.” Catra threw an arm around Adora's shoulders. “We never needed to know anything about our birth families before, and we don't now. We're all we need.”

“But what if I do need her?” Adora worried. “What if she knows something about me that changes everything?”

“Then she should've thought about that before she abandoned you!” Glimmer cried. “Am I the only one mad about this?”

“Of course not! I'm furious! I just―” Adora huffed. “It wouldn't be right to just―just let her die.”

She pursed her lips. Catra's hand snaked down from her shoulder to her wrist, and held it in quiet support.

Unbidden, a memory flashed in Adora's mind―holding Catra's hand in the Crystal Castle, clutching it as soon as she found her, where she watched the castle's defenses attack―watching helplessly as Shadow Weaver dropped her mask and obliterated the room.

Watching helplessly as Angella flew into the portal, seizing a sacrifice meant for Adora.

Watching helplessly as Light Hope faded away, as Mara's last holographic message collapsed.

Watching helplessly as Marlena was carried in, broken and bleeding.

“I have to heal her, and then...deal with confronting her afterward,” Adora said. “Either that, or I watch my mother die for the third time.”

Glimmer's anger shrank, to guilt and grief. She leaned against Bow.

“Or you don’t watch,” Catra countered. “You let her go.”

Adora shook her head, as if she could shake the memories away like raindrops from her hair. Whether or not she watched, it would still happen, and it would still be her fault.

“This might not just be about Adora, though,” Bow interjected. “This woman is...the greatest source of history we could hope for. She's a living First One. The  _ last _ First One. Imagine the knowledge we could get about Adora's past, about Etheria's past―”

Catra snorted. “Okay, stop. Last First One? Do you even realize how stupid that sounds? Like, is she last or is she first?”

“Not the time, Catra!” Glimmer snapped.

Adora sighed. “As much as I understand how important that information would be, the First Ones...weren't good people. She's not a good person. All things considered, the universe would probably be better off without her.”

“Hey. Adora.”

Catra lightly punched her bicep and leaned on her shoulder.

“Forget about the universe,” she said. “What's gonna be better for you?”

Adora bit her tongue. She'd been working on letting go of the self-sacrifice impulse, but it was hard not to fall into sometimes. It was hard to know what she wanted. It was easier to think about everyone else, calculate the broadest possible benefit, divide everything into hard lines and numbers of morality. It was harder to face her own nebulous heart.

“Then we do what Bow said,” she tried. “We use her for information. We call up his dads and any other historians―”

“No. Catra's right.” Bow stepped to stand directly in front of her. “This is  _ your _ mother. It's your life she's affected the most.”

He took her hands in his and held them tight.

“We love you, Adora, and we trust you,” he said. “Whatever you choose, we're right there with you.”

Glimmer stepped up as well, and laid a comforting hand on Adora's waist. “Always.”

Adora smiled. It was hard not to around her best friends.

“Okay,” she said. “Maybe I just need some time alone with her.”

“Of course.”

A squeeze of Bow's hands, and he turned to leave. A tight hug from Glimmer, and she followed him. A quick kiss for Catra.

“Yeah, I don't think so,” Catra smirked.

Adora rolled her eyes, but let Catra pull her into a longer kiss. It was their anniversary tomorrow, after all. They'd spent far too long  _ not _ kissing to shortchange any of the time they had now.

“I'll stay with you if you need,” Catra murmured, holding her forehead to Adora's. “Just say the word, and I'll stay.”

“I know.” Adora breathed in, breathed out. “I'll be okay.”

“Promise?”

“Promise.”

“Okay.”

She pulled away, keeping a hold on Adora's hand until she was out of reach.

Adora closed her eyes as Catra's footsteps retreated down the hall. She faced the door and held out her hand.

_ “For the honor of Grayskull.” _

The sword's hilt formed under her palm. She grasped it, and let its energy flow through her, beaming up her veins and lifting her off the ground. When she touched back down, she could still feel the glow in her skin.

She-Ra opened the door and approached the dying queen's bedside. She dropped to one knee, an open hand splayed above Marlena's chest.

Marlena stirred. She grunted, grimaced. Her eyes slitted open.

She lifted a hand and grabbed She-Ra's wrist.

She-Ra's light wavered.

“Don't,” Marlena said. “Please.”

She-Ra's brow arched, desperate and scared. “You'll die if I―”

“Please.”

She-Ra gritted her teeth, fingers trembling. Her hand closed into a fist.

The light faded.

Abruptly She-Ra fell back into Adora, her legs buckling and her back collapsing. The sword evaporated. She buried her face in the mattress.

The room was dark. Adora was crying.

“I'll stay with you,” she choked out, once she was able to breathe even a little without sobbing. “I―I'm going to stay with you.”

Marlena's hand was still around her daughter's wrist. And gently, sluggishly, she let go.

“Thank you.”

Adora sniffed sharply against the wetness in her nose; sniffed again, a weak attempt to clear her aching lungs. Gradually her tears subsided.

She pulled the nearby chair up close to the bed. She folded her arms atop the sheets and used them as a rest for her head.

Marlena's soft breath was steady. It was late. It was quiet. She fell asleep fast.

* * *

“You both turned out gay.”

Adora cracked her eyes open and sat up a little. Her arms tingled from the pressure she'd been putting on them, and the creases of the sheet had probably left red marks across her face.

Marlena was awake, almost. Her eyes were just barely open.

“I―” Adora rubbed her eye, crusted with sleep and dried tears. “What?”

“You fell in love with a girl. Adam only ever liked boys.” Marlena's voice was high and airy with exhaustion, like she didn't have the energy to speak any louder. “I always liked both, but the place and time where I grew up, I didn't even have the option to consider not marrying a man.”

Adora's heart fluttered a little. She was no historian, but that tickling urge for knowledge, to understand her own past, her own family...it was undeniable.

“Where did you grow up?” she asked.

“A suburb of Cincinnati, Ohio. U-S-A. Planet Earth. Nineteen fifty-six.”

None of those words meant anything to Adora. “Is that a place in Eternia?”

“No. Earth was another world. It's probably gone now, too.”

Adora lifted herself a few degrees more, just enough to bend her elbows up and lay her chin on the heels of her hands. “What was my brother like?”

Marlena smiled weakly. “Brave. Funny. Friendly. Smarter than he ever let on.” Her breath shook. “Loyal, too. He trusted and loved with all his heart.”

“Did you name him?”

“Mm-hm. Adam's the name of...well, what some people believe was the name of the first human on Earth. I always thought it sounded princely.”

“What would…“ Adora hesitated. Closed her eyes again, briefly; breathed her way through. “If you had kept me. What would you have named me?”

“Your father wanted to name you after some old Eternian goddess. Veena. Doesn't that sound ridiculous?”

“No.”

“Sounds like the name of some stuck-up gasbag. Like an old opera singer made of more jewelry than flesh.”

Adora stifled a snort, but allowed herself a smirk. Marlena was staring at the ceiling again. If she wasn't still half asleep, she was probably delirious from pain.

Marlena turned her head to look at Adora. Her eyes looked paler than before in the dim moonlight. She slowly lifted one hand to Adora's cheek.

Adora flinched.

But this was different―new. This wasn't Shadow Weaver's capture or Angella's goodbye. Marlena touched her cheek with the back of her hand, her knuckles callused and light. She wasn't trying to hold on to her. She touched her like she was made of marble, cold and distant, but awesome and precious. Like she still couldn't really believe she was there. Like she couldn't quite reconcile the woman Adora was now with the infant she must have known.

“I was a pilot, back on Earth,” Marlena said. “That was a hard thing for a woman to get respect doing, but I had some heroes I could look back on who'd done it before me. Well, one in particular that I really loved.” Her smile strengthened the slightest bit. “I think I would've named you Amelia. After her.”

Adora swallowed. “Amelia.”

“Mm-hm.”

She tilted her head in a slight nod. “It's pretty.”

“Mm-hm.”

Her hand fell. The spots of Adora's skin she'd been touching suddenly felt cold, mourning her absence.

Adora let her own hands fall, her arms folding again, her weight on her elbows. She had more questions, so many more questions―but she didn't have time for them all. She couldn't even think of where to start. More questions about her brother, about her father, about her cousins and aunts and grandparents and great-grandparents. About Eternia, about Earth. About Amelia.

About herself.

One question burned hotter than the rest, at the forefront of her mind. It was probably impertinent. It was probably cruel. But she didn't know how much time she had. She couldn't let her mother go without ever knowing.

“Why'd you give me up?”

“To destroy the Horde.”

“Yeah, but...why? Why would you―how could―” She cut herself off, rifling through her words. “Why was that so important to you?”

It was almost what she really wanted to say.

_ Why was loving me less important than hating them? _

But in her heart, she probably already knew. The greater good. The broadest possible benefit.

Marlena didn't say anything for a long time. For a second Adora worried she'd crossed a line, and the queen wasn't willing to answer. For another second she worried she'd spoken too late, and Marlena was gone, and she'd wasted her last moments.

Then, finally, Marlena chuckled, rasping and short.

“I thought they were just more Russians,” she said. “More enemies to defeat. And once I became queen, and actually had the power to defeat them...maybe it went to my head.” Her chuckle faded. “Amazing what your deathbed will help you realize, isn't it.”

It wasn't a question. It didn't expect a response. Adora stayed silent.

Marlena spoke without looking at her.

“Are you happy, Princess?”

“Not at this exact moment, no,” Adora said bluntly.

“Are you happy here, in Etheria? If you had a choice, would you stay?” Marlena asked. “Are you loved?”

If she had a choice, if she had a choice. She didn't have a choice. She'd never had a choice. Everything she ever did had been someone else's machinations.

But...no, she did. She chose to leave the Horde. She chose to break the Sword of Protection. She chose to save the world.

She chose Catra. She chose to be loved.

“Yes,” she said. “Yeah.”

Marlena's eyelids fell closed, and Adora knew that now they wouldn't open again.

“Good, then,” the queen said, more breath than voice, more rattle than breath. “Good.”

* * *

By the time the sun rose, Marlena had stopped breathing.

They didn't quite hold a proper funeral, but they invited George and Lance to come share anything they knew of First Ones' burial traditions. They wrapped her in an empty white shroud they'd found in a crumbling temple. They laid her in a small boat, coated with oil and painted with runes of farewell, and set it afloat toward Bright Moon's falls.

Adora had told them everything Marlena said over the night, but during the ceremony, she was silent.

“Bet Entrapta woulda loved to get her hands on that corpse,” Catra muttered.

Glimmer scoffed. “Sucks to be her, I guess.”

Bow nocked an arrow, the tip already alight, and let it fly for the drifting pyre.

  
  


* * *

  
  


_ december _

  
  


The queen bore fraternal twins, one a deep brown almost pink and one a soft pink almost lavender, and loved them with all she had the moment she laid eyes on them. The queen's consort might have loved them even more, if that were possible.

Etherian tradition was to have a few names picked out for the child before they were born―one gender-neutral or two to three options the child could choose from as they grew. Glimmer and Bow had made the decisions months ago, but kept it a surprise until they were ready to invite the other half of their squad into the birth chamber.

Adora timidly poked her head through the door, her hand tight around Catra's. “Are the babies okay?”

Glimmer grinned, and it was hard to tell whether the excess shine on her skin was perspiration or just pure joy. “Come inside already! They want to meet you!”

Catra's head appeared directly below Adora's. “They're babies. They can't want anything yet except food.”

Bow crossed the room and yanked them in, forcing through their hesitations and protests. “You're not gonna hurt them just by being nearby. I promise.”

Micah gave his daughter one last kiss on the forehead and left with Castaspella and the midwife. Bow's fathers would be at Bright Moon in a day or two, and the other princesses would arrive for a massive celebration in a week, but the rest of this night was meant just for the Best Friend Squad. The door shut softly.

After a final tentative second, Catra crawled into Glimmer's bed and peered over her shoulder at the twins. Adora still stood stiff; Bow steered her by the shoulders to the nearest chair and sat her down.

“This one is Stiletto,” Glimmer said, gently bouncing the baby in her left arm. “Keeping the tradition from Bow's family.”

“Of course when you have to pick a weapon name you go for the most gussied-up one imaginable,” Catra teased, twirling a dark downy lock of hair around a delicate fingertip. “Maybe I'll just call 'em Shiv instead.”

“Oh, you won't think it's gussied up once I teach him how to really use a stiletto knife. After I learn how to use them.”

“And Adora, this…“ Bow nodded to Glimmer and lifted the smaller child from her arm. He cradled its tiny head and neck with one hand, its body resting neatly across his forearm. He knelt beside Adora's chair and held the baby out for her to take. “This is Amelia.”

“Or, if she prefers, when she's older,” Glimmer said, “Adam.”

Adora blinked, eyes suddenly stinging.

She'd held babies before, of course she had. First orphans that she thought the Horde was helping like she thought they'd helped her, then the children of happy Etherians grateful to She-Ra, then every one of Bow's many nieces and nephews once things had settled down. She knew how to hold a baby. She was practically an expert on it. There was no reason for this baby to be any different.

She bent her arms into a snug, secure nest, exactly according with her expertise. She made sure the baby's head was supported in the crook of her elbow, and that she held her close enough to her chest to mimic the squeezy comfort of the womb but not so close that she squished her or suffocated her or crushed her teensy fragile body like an eggshell―

Amelia squirmed a little, eyes squinting up tight and one arm of pillowy fat and gossamer bone flailing out in a stretch. Adora's breath hitched in her throat. Then Amelia relaxed, and her squinty eyes popped open. 

She was beautiful. She was beautiful and perfect and her eyes were a dark, glistening blue, staring right at Adora, studying her, curious and marveling and...loving. Adora loved this baby like nothing else and Amelia loved her right back.

“Oh,” Adora whispered. “Oh, wow.”

“She's amazing, huh?” Bow smiled.

“Bow, she's perfect,” Adora squeaked. Tears were already flowing freely down her cheeks. “I love her. I want to keep her.”

“Well, yeah,” Glimmer laughed. “You didn't think we were gonna raise them without you, did you?”

“You're their family, too,” Bow said, lightly knocking Adora with his shoulder.

Catra chuckled. “Hey, Adora―they're the best of both worlds. They're not our flesh-and-blood family, but they're the flesh and blood of the people we love.”

“Aww.” Glimmer ticked her tongue. “Catra  _ loooves _ us―”

“Oh, shut up―”

Glimmer slung her free arm around Catra's neck and pressed a loud smooch to her cheek. Catra couldn't shove her away without disturbing Stiletto, and thus had no choice but to accept the kiss.

Adora could feel Amelia's hummingbird heart thrumming hot and strong in her little chest. The warm beat was proof that all this was real. It wasn't a wish or a fantasy. It was the future she'd chosen. It was the family she'd chosen.

She wiped her tears away with the back of her hand.

If she'd had a choice. There was no telling what would have happened if she chose then, if she chose that, if she chose a hundred times over.

Right now, she was here, and she was choosing this, and she was happy.

**Author's Note:**

> i put marlena's birth year as 1956 so she arrives in eternia in 1984, which is when the original filmation series aired (particularly the episode “the rainbow warrior", which depicts her backstory). I was gonna have it so 1984 is when he-man actually has his adventures but that would've had marlena reaching eternia in the 60s, intergalactic one-manned space travel from earth before we even went to the moon, and I'm not quite willing to bend history That much sdfjk
> 
> anyways as a reward for surviving all this angst please enjoy [this ancient video of my baby brother (he's 16 now) reenacting the masters of the universe intro,](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=okvt_uLWWk8) ft. 8-yr-old me as battlecat


End file.
